Michael Laser - Cheater

Letting that pass, Upchurch says, “For the record, I didn’t organize this to benefit myself. It’s for the whole town.”

The claim is so preposterous, there’s no way to challenge it without calling Upchurch a liar. “I don’t see how that could possibly be true.”

“Then listen: the school’s standardized test scores have been going down, and that’s affecting the real estate market. New Jersey Magazine didn’t include our school in its Top Fifty last year. No one’s going to pay a million for a four-bedroom house in a town where the high school sucks. Now do you understand?”

Karl is lost as a lamb in a dark labyrinth, but he can’t bring himself to admit it. “Sort of.”

A deep sigh, a roll of the eye. “My father’s going to run for mayor in November. You know who he is, right? Randall Upchurch? Cathedral Realty?”

“Uh-huh.”

Mr. Hydine groans in his sleep and says, “Please-no!” Upchurch freezes, and waits until the snoring resumes.

“Okay, I’ll spell it out for you. Raise the school’s SAT scores and you raise the value of every house in town.”

“But, for that to happen, lots of people would have to be part of the Confederacy. And they’re not.”

“Oh, they are. Just because they keep a low profile, that doesn’t mean they’re all playing it straight.”

“But I only saw”-he counts on his fingers-“… six people cheat. Plus you.”

“A lot goes on under the surface. The point is, the principal knows all about it, and he wants us to cheat, because that way he can keep his job, which he wouldn’t if everyone got scores like last year’s.”

Karl can’t decide whether or not he should believe a word Upchurch has said. On the one hand, anything’s possible. On the other, if the whole school has been cheating and the principal approves, that’s just too… hideous.

But he doesn’t want Upchurch to know he’s upset. “Aside from the property values, I guess the higher grades won’t hurt when you apply to colleges.”

“Are you insulting me? Are you saying I’m really doing it just for myself? Is that what you’re saying?”

“I’m not sure. Maybe. I don’t know.”

“That’s right, Karl. You really don’t know much about anything.”

A cell phone rings, playing “Hail to the Chief.” Upchurch checks the caller’s number and moves to the doorway. He keeps his back to Karl. “What?… The Friendly Kitchen doesn’t have a security person, how can they ask volunteers for ID?… That’s insane… Well-just tell them you lost your wallet, you don’t have any ID on you. Look, figure it out. I’m not going to pay you if you don’t sign me in, obviously.”

Uninformed and ill though Karl may be, he’s able to piece together these clues. A profile in The Emancipator last fall reported that Upchurch volunteered at the Rainbow Afterschool Center, tutoring little kids; at the Ida and Bob Jergenson Senior Center, visiting with the elderly; and at the Friendly Kitchen, serving hot meals to the homeless. Karl wondered back then how one person could find the time to do so much, on top of his many other activities. Now he has the answer: someone else has been serving those hot meals and signing Upchurch’s name. Chances are he has similar arrangements at the Afterschool and Senior centers.

Though Karl never speaks the insult aloud- You sleaze-bag!- it must be legible on his face.

“There are reasons for everything I do, Karl. And I don’t go around breaking rules unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

“How is faking community service absolutely necessary?”

“If you want to go to an Ivy League school and you’re not an athlete or the son of an alumnus, it’s totally necessary. There aren’t that many slots, Karl-and the applicants are all superhuman. They don’t just win every competition they enter-they deliver medicine to sick Eskimos by dogsled, and play the oboe with the New York Philharmonic. You would know all this if you ever lifted your head out of whatever stupid comic book you waste your time on.”

The more Upchurch talks, the more Karl wishes he had the physical strength to punch him in the nose. Since he doesn’t, and since Upchurch’s cologne is starting to make him sick to his stomach, he asks bluntly, “Why did you come here?”

Again, Upchurch waves at Mr. Hydine’s unconscious face and peeks up and down the hall. He leans in close to Karl so no one else will hear.

“I have to know what you told Klimchock. And I need you to help us with the SAT.”

If Upchurch thinks Karl will help him after all his insults, then Upchurch’s brain has a serious defect. Karl laughs at him contemptuously-but this proves to be a painful mistake, because it triggers another coughing fit.

“What if I don’t help you?” he chokes out.

“You’ll be squashed like a worm under a boot. Bad things will happen to you. But that’s not how it’s going to be. You’re going to help us.”

Why does his tone of voice sound so familiar? Wait- could it be? Yes-he’s modeling himself, confusingly, on Klimchock. It’s as if the Joker’s son became Batman’s new sidekick.

“Take a look at this,” Upchurch says. From the pocket of his shorts, he removes… a number two pencil.

Karl withholds his admiration.

“Don’t judge a pencil by its looks. This is not your father’s Dixon Ticonderoga. Look here.”

His fingernail points to a small opening in the ferrule, the metal part that holds the eraser on.

“Take a feel.”

He hands Karl the pencil. It’s heavy-as if it were made of steel, not wood.

“That opening is a lens. Inside this pencil-which you can also use to write your answers-is a compact, state-of-the-art cheating machine. First, it recognizes letters and numbers. Second, it generates a voice that speaks the number of the question and the letter you darkened. Third, it transmits the message to whoever’s listening by earphone. You fill in the answers, then sweep the lens over them, and the Magic Pencil does the rest. The only thing missing is a human brain to supply the right answers.”

So far, Karl has taken all of Upchurch’s bullying like… like… a sick person in a hospital. The time has come to fight back.

“What if I say no-and if you do anything to me, then I’ll turn you in as the biggest cheater of all, and a community service fraud?”

An effortless parry: “Sorry, but there’s no evidence against me, and you’re already in disgrace. Anything you say will sound like desperate raving.”

Outside, the rain has left shadowy stains on the concrete wall across the airshaft. The uneaten part of Karl’s lunch is growing more repulsive by the minute.

“I don’t have all day, Karl. What did you tell Klimchock?”

He can’t see a way out. No matter what he does, it will end in disaster.

He sucks his lips in, thinking, thinking.

“Don’t smirk at me. Did you give him any names or not?”

Karl doesn’t know what to say and doesn’t want to give any information away just in case.

Upchurch eyes Karl’s IV tube. He wouldn’t yank it- would he?

“You’re not going to mess me up.”

He takes one of the three CDs Karl’s mother brought and waves it in Karl’s face. “You want me to get your old pals thrown out of school? Is that what you want?”

Karl yawns-not for theatrical effect but because he’s intensely tired.

In a fit, out of control, Upchurch snatches all three CDs from the rolling tray and pitches them into the round hole of the red biohazard bin.

The message seems to be, I’ll do the same to you if you don’t obey me.

Nurse Francesca is standing in the doorway. “I saw that. You can’t play adolescent pranks in here-your friend is sick. What’s wrong with you?”